Voyage on the DBT Enterprise – Science Fiction Meets BPD and DBT

I’m excited to share something with you.  What started out as an intention to practice the DBT skills of self-soothing, distraction, and taking a mental vacation turned into an entirely new endeavor that now also allows me to practice finding meaning and building a life worth living.

Although, up until now, I hadn’t much interest in science fiction and hadn’t been inspired to (aside from some poetry) write anything but autobiographical and self-help style posts and books, I am surprised to now be hooked on a series that ran for about ten years, starting in 1987, called Star Trek: The Next Generation (also known as #STNG).

Fond memories remain with me of my father watching the predecessor show, the original Star Trek series.  Tired of my favorite shows running out of episodes after binge watches on Netflix and the seasons ending on my other favorites, I wanted to find something that would last for a while… something I could get into and wouldn’t run out of episodes for some time to come.

While perusing Netflix, I came across STNG.  I thought, “eh, why not?”  The first episode didn’t grab me too much.  I judged the actors as overacting. I was going to delete it from my queue/list.

I decided not to give up after one episode.  I noticed my black or white thinking and thought it would only be fair to give the series a few more episodes before deciding if it were worthy of my time.  Just one episode wasn’t enough to make a final decision, as I also enjoyed many aspects and liked how I was relating it back to BPD and DBT.

I kept watching and became incredibly inspired.    I was relating a lot of the characters’ behaviors (such as Counselor Troi’s ability as en empathy) back to Borderline Personality Disorder.  I was even observing occurrences of the characters demonstrating the practice of DBT skills — or situations where I thought it would have behooved them to do so.

After a few conversations on the topic, a student of mine created the Facebook group: DBT and Pop Culture – Boldy Going Where DBT Has Never Gone Before.  I joined and am very active there.

One thing led to another, and the new (b)log, DBT Enterprise was born! It is my latest project — a fusion of science fiction and contemporary theories on Borderline Personality Disorder and Dialectical Behavior Therapy.

If you have an interest in sci-fi, you may enjoy it.  You may surprise yourself, as I did, if you haven’t had an interest in science fiction to date.  Perhaps you’ll simply enjoy a new, interesting, and unique way of looking at the skills.

Whatever the situation may be, I hope you’ll check it out and let me know what you think.  It’s my latest project and my new baby. 🙂   Of course my personal, auto-biographical, type blog posts that you’ve come to know and love will remain here at Healing From BPD.  DBT Enterprise is a separate venture focusing on connecting the episodes of STNG back to BPD and DBT.

What started out as a TV series that I hoped would help me de-stress and unwind on the couch with my cats at night turned into something I could never have imagined.

May you be inspired, too!

Thank you for reading.

More soon.

In kindness,
Debbie (aka Jennivere — you’ll see if you visit the DBT Enterprise)